The Byzantine Communion Chant for Easter in 14Th
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THE BYZANTINE COMMUNION CHANT FOR EASTER IN 14TH-CENTURY MANUSCRIPTS by HORST BERNHARD LOESCHMANN B. Mus., The University of British Columbia, 1976 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS in THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES (Department of Music) We accept this thesis as conforming to the required standard THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA October 1982 © Horst Bernhard Loeschmann, 1982 In presenting this thesis in partial fulfilment of the requirements for an advanced degree at the University of British Columbia, I agree that the Library shall make it freely available for reference and study. I further agree that permission for extensive copying of this thesis for scholarly purposes may be granted by the head of my department or by his or her representatives. It is understood that copying or publication of this thesis for financial gain shall not be allowed without my written permission. Department of Misin The University of British Columbia 1956 Main Mall Vancouver, Canada V6T 1Y3 Date October 18, 1982 DE-6 (3/81) ABSTRACT It is only recently that the attention of musicologists has been directed to the study of Eastern church music as transmitted in 14th and 15th-century Byzantine manuscripts. This constitutes a reversal of the prejudices held by most pioneers in the discipline, who believed that the musical oeuvre of the late Byzantine empire was only a pallid reflection of a once magnificent style, and was, therefore, unworthy of detailed examina• tion. In its support of the current reassessment of the late Byzantine musical style, this study shows that, in spite of the declining fortunes of the empire, the composers of that time fashioned a vital and distinguished culmination to a millenium of liturgical composition. The thesis is limited to a clearly discernible entity within the 14th-century repertoire: the Easter Koinonikon, or Communion chant, Euiua xPT-crxou, a hymn conveyed by at least fourteen manuscripts representing the works of some seven composers. The eight settings considered here comprise the entire 14th-century collection of this chant that has survived the vicissitudes of time. The method of investigation is both historical and analytical. Its results reveal a hitherto unsuspected degree of consanguinity among the musical materials of all seven composers, one which is delineated by the establishment of three distinct sub-groupings. These, in turn, further emphasize the presence of a known thesaurus of musical elements. A simi• larity of various compositional procedures also becomes evident. The most iii. significant of these is the use of a refrain that is analagous to the Alleluia refrain which occurs in most other Communion hymns. There are, naturally, a number of stylistic differences that appear in the written tradition during the course of the century,.and these reflect a gradual evolution of the composers' idiom. Of particular interest to future studies is the development of a tentative chronology for these seven composers, since in many cases this supersedes their currently accepted dating. Most importantly, however, is the fact that this study focusses attention and sheds new light on a neglected area of Byzantine music history, and indicates the need for continuing research in this field. iv. TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ABSTRACT ii LIST OF TABLES v LIST OF FIGURES vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS vii INTRODUCTION 1 SOURCE MATERIAL 6 TEXT 22 COMPOSERS 32 MUSIC 43 SUMMARY: A. Changes 72 B. Stasis 87 CONCLUSIONS 101 BIBLIOGRAPHY 105 V. LIST OF TABLES Table Page I List of Primary Manuscripts Consulted 4 II Average Frequency of Text-Phrase Endings Coincident with Musical Cadences 23 III Average Text-Element Repetition 24 IV Earliest MSS that Contain Any Koinonika by Each Composer 34 V Ordering of Settings of Ewya xpi°"rou in MSS 39 VI Modal Assignment of Ecoya xpicnrou in Securely-Dated MSS 40 VII Length of Ewya xpi-°"rou Melodies 73 VIII Interval Usage in Percentages , 76 IX Proportion of Music in Text and ''Re'frain-' 98: vi. LIST OF FIGURES Figure Page 1 : Refrain Repetition in Gerasimos's Setting 18 2 Text Parallelism in Glyke's TevoaoQe and £ooua xP^a^ov 28 3 Changing Ambitus in Suya XPT-0"1^ 75 vi i. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I should like to express a deep sense of obligation to all who have helped me in this research. Dr. Dimitri Conomos spawned my interest in Byzantine musicology, and has assiduously nurtured it through the course of a number of years. I am thankful to him for suggesting this topic, and for his encouragement and invaluable assistance during my travails of a sometimes forbidding, occasionally even vexatious, territory. To my parents I am greatly indebted. They have constantly offered their support to my academic endeavours, and have unstintingly helped me in innumerable ways. Above all, my wife, Diana, has assisted incalculably at all stages of this thesis; the editing and typing of the first draft signals but two major instances. More importantly, though, her devotion and unceasing love were an inestimable support. Without her this thesis would not.have materialized. To all the above, and to many other friends who offered a mul• titude of kindnesses, I can do no better than to proffer the salutation of the Byzantine polychronion: A6£a 6ea> xui 6o£aaowxi ae OUTCQS. A6§a 9eu xw euSoKiiaavxi ouxws ... ItoAAou vp\v xpovoi of 6epcarovT£s xou Kupxou. 1. INTRODUCTION For the past two decades musical scholars have devoted increasing attention to the vast amount of liturgical music composed in the final century and a half of the Byzantine Empire (1300-1450). The pioneers in the discipline of Byzantine musicology generally eschewed this reper• toire, for they considered it a vitiated and superficial reflection of 'classical' Byzantine music and hymnographyJ A reassessment of the pro• digious musical output that manifests itself in the declining years of the Empire has gradually taken place, however, and has revealed this period as constituting a vital and distinguished culmination of a millenium of liturgical composition. The present study focusses on an example of one of the significant groups of chants for the Divine Liturgy in the.East as transmitted by 14th- century musical manuscripts — the Communion antiphon, Ztoucx. XP^TOU. The Communion hymn, or Koinonikon, comprises the largest body of proper psalmody that is used in the Mass of the Orthodox Church, and consists of a cycle of twenty-six texts, each of which is allocated to one or more occasions in the liturgical year. This collection reflects a usage that was fully developed at least by the 11th century, but which can, in fact, be traced back to the 9th century, as reflections of its existence can be "*"Egon Wellesz disparaged this repertoire as ". .the rather superficial coloratura style of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries." Such deprecation is not uncharacteristic of the attitude of most early scholars in the field. Egon Wellesz, A History of Byzantine Music and Hymnography, 2d ed., rev. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1961), p. 23. 2. seen in the Patmos and Holy Cross typika. As with many of the major hymns in the Byzantine Rite, the Koinonikon is used too cover a liturgical action. After the Elevation=and fraction of the Consecrated Gifts, the priest intones the words "Holy things for the holy," and the congregation responds with the chant "One is holy. ." Following this, the clergy 3 receive Communion while the choir sings the Communion antiphon.. The antiphon Etoua XPT-°"TOO is used as the proper Koinonikon for Easter. Its connection with this feast is clearly an old tradition, as it is without exception specified by all liturgical ordos from Constantinople. The text of this hymn is one of only two non-scriptural Koinonika, and as 5 such the customary pendant Alleluia is omitted: Eooua xPT-0"rou uexaAaBeTe Trnyns aBavaxou yetioaoQe ("Partake of the body of Christ, taste the source of immortality") It must also be noted:, however, that in addition to the use of this hymn for the Communion of the clergy at Easter, it also seems to have Dimitri Conomos, "Communion Chants in Magna Graecia and Byzantium," JAMS XXXIII (Summer 1980): 24-3; also see idem, "Psalmody and the Communion Cycle," St. Vladimir's Theological Quarterly 25 (1981): 4-7-48. The Typikon (TUTTlKOV) is a liturgical book which contains the Rule for the Service of all Liturgies and Offices for the entire church year. 3 Mother Mary and Kallistos Ware, The Festal Menaion (London: Faber and Faber, 1969), p. 80. 14. Conomos, "Psalmody and the Communion Cycle," p. 113. The Jerusalem ordo of 1122, and the somewhat earlier Palestinian practice as reflected in a Georgian lectionary, both contribute unique exceptions to this prescription (ibid., pp. 114—16). Neither of these practices,however, is contained in any of the musical MSS under consideration. 5 The other non-scriptural Koinonikon is the troparion Tou 6£lTTVOU OOU for Holy Thursday. 3. been used regularly throughout the liturgical year during the Communion of the faithful. Currently this is still common practice in the Greek and Slavic churches, and on occasion Too Seiirvou aou is also chanted for the same purpose. This usage, which constitutes an unwritten convention, may in all likelihood be dated to the 12th century. Liturgical documents up to that time indicate that in both Eastern and Western rites the Communion hymn was generally used during the people's Communion. It was only sometime during that century that the Koinonikon was transferred to its customary loca• tion at the Communion of the clergy; as if to compensate for this, a tradi• r tion of using Exoya xPT-a^0U f° the Communion of the laity during most liturgies evolved.